Let me add to what people have said.
1. Wolverine Data FlashPac 7-in-1 (aka Vosonic X-Drive II VP2160 if I am not mixing up the model number) It is rather slow: 8'20" to transfer 953 MB in 96 .PEF files, This makes the transfer speed being ~1.9 MB/s. (tested on SanDisk Ultra II 1GB SD card). I haven't tested the transfer rate for CF, but it is not much faster. Rather than this, - I didn't have much problem with it. Battery life: It allowed me to transfer 11.5 times from an almost full 1GB ULtra II SanDisk SD card (96 files, 953 MB) It died on the 12th transfer after trasnferring 52 files (523 MB). So, the total size of files transferred on a single charge: 10.7 GB This was done over two series of transfers within one day: mid-day and than in the evening. The recommendation I hear from some users: It makes sense to empty the drive completely time to time, after it was mostly filled up and then partially erased, and then filled again. This helps to avoid fragmentation on the disk. Apparently, sometimes, high level of fragmentation is not handled well by this sort of devices. Some people even recommend reformating it once in a while. 2. Hyperdrive Space ------------------- Hyperdrive Space is a new model, - the successor of the rather successful HD80 (aka pdx70 model sold by Compactdrive). I believe, Hyperdrive never released any firmware upgrade for HD80 to support SDHC cards, but Space does support them. Fast transfer speed and long battery life are two good features of Hyperdrive Space. I am seriously considering buying one for myself. You may compare prices: various capacities are sold by B&H and by hyperdrive.com (hypershop.com) For more information on HyperDrive devices - search forums on dpreview.com. Alternatives I was consdidering for myself: 3. Nexto Ultra from compactdrive.com /eastgear.com It has rather comparable specs to those of HD Space, but I like the verification capability that HD Space has (not first hand experience, rather from description and other users' comments). 4. If you want to have preview (I decided I don't care that much - I cannot justify extra $$ and extra weight) - Epson or Vosonic (6xxx or 8xxx series models, I believe) seem to be very reasonable candidates. If I remember correctly, there were some Vosonic models that don't have video preview but are capable of playing music (mp3). HTH, Igor -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
